Once Upon a Marriage

He followed her to the door.

Stan, the security guard on duty out front that night, said good-night as Law Girl exited first. Law Girl started to speak and Stan was taking a few steps with her. Toward a car parked at the curb. Latte hadn’t left. And Marie forgot all about the people outside.

She heard the click of the lock on the front door—it was an old door with a dead bolt that turned with a knob from the inside and it squeaked...

With a flash, she remembered seeing Elliott’s car pull away shortly before Latte had come in.

“Don’t move.” There was nothing friendly about the man approaching her. He had a gun. Held close to his arm so you’d have to look close to see it unless you were right in front of him. As she was. Staring down the barrel.

“I already made a bank deposit, but what’s left of the day’s take is in the drawer. I’ll open it for you.” She leaned toward the register. And he was over the counter, one arm around her throat, the other holding a gun pointed to her neck.

She could hear rattling at the door. And Stan yelling. Calling her name.

“Come in and she’s dead,” her captor hollered.

“You aren’t going to get away with this.” Cold with stark raving fear, Marie blabbered. Probably something she’d heard from TV. Tears filled her eyes. But when her captor pushed her forward, toward the hall leading back to her office, she didn’t stumble.

And she didn’t fight him.

“I don’t intend to get away with it,” the man spit in her ear as he spoke. “That’s the beauty of my plan. I don’t have to care about getting caught. And my plan is unfolding with perfect execution.”

They were at the end of the hall already. He pushed her into the stairwell. It felt like a freezer.

“Where are we going?” Stay calm. Keep him on the stairs. Residents use the elevator.

“Just go.”

She had no real choice, certain that if she tried to stop him, he’d just shoot her. The longer she kept herself alive, the longer someone had to get to her. Stan would have called 911. And the guard out back.

“Go,” he said again, when her toe hit the tip of a stair and she hitched. The only heat in a cold world was his body pressed up against hers. Hip to hip. Thigh to thigh. Mouth to ear.

Gun barrel to neck.

They were on the landing, halfway up to the second floor. His body shoved hers and they turned. Climbed the next step. She wasn’t going to leave the stairwell. On the second-floor landing, if he reached for the door she was going to shove with all her weight. Push him into the railing. It was old. And hopefully wouldn’t hold. He could go over. If his gun went off in the process, if she died, she’d have spared everyone else in the building.

“Good. Keep going.”

She was keeping him calm. And trying not to think about his intentions.

He knew he was going to get caught. Didn’t care. He was willing to give up his life for what he was doing.

They reached the second-floor landing. He didn’t move for the door. Instead, he forced her body around and to the next step.

And she knew.

Liam’s stalker. Someone who felt he’d already lost everything. Or had nothing left to lose.

They were headed up to Liam’s apartment. A vision of her and Gabi and Liam shot execution-style on that new floor flashed in front of her eyes. Accompanied by a loud bang. A gunshot.

She felt a thrust, a sudden push to her back and she was free. Not hurt. Spinning, she turned in time to see her attacker, feet planted firmly on the floor, pointing his gun back the way they’d come.

At Elliott. And she realized that the bullet that had fired had been from the gun he had aimed at the man who’d kidnapped her.

In that second another round of gunfire rang out. She saw Elliott’s arm jerk as his gun went off. Saw him rear back as he was hit. Saw his gun go off again.

He couldn’t die. She’d just figured out that she’d trusted him all along. That it was her head playing with her the other night—taking the easy way out by repeating over and over in her mind that picture of Elliott with that other woman.

Her father had been right. She had instincts—strong ones—about whom she could trust. Not on a case-by-case, statement-by-statement or promise-by-promise basis, but on a heart basis. A lifetime basis.